The old proverb, ?April showers bring May flowers,? is meant to teach us to see the bright side of the rain. By this time of year we are all ready for the rain to end and warm summer weather to come again. This general dislike for rainy days in April got the RealEstate.com team wondering how the amount of rainfall in a city affects the home prices in the rainiest cities. If people really dislike rainy weather, we would expect to see lower home prices in the cities with more rain.
Creating the April Showers Infographic
The first step was finding the rainiest cities in the United States. The perception was that the rainiest city would be in the city most known for rain: Seattle, Wash. Surprisingly, this was not the case. Seattle did not even make the top 25 rainiest cities, with less annual rainfall than Atlanta and New York City. The top two rainiest cities were Seattle?s neighbors in the Pacific Northwest ? Forks, Wash. and Astoria, Ore. ? but the rest were in the southeastern United States and mostly on the Gulf Coast. So while the Gulf Coast region gets fewer rainy days and is sunnier than the Northwest, when it rains on the Gulf Coast it often pours, making it one of the rainiest regions.
Once we had our cities, the RealEstate.com team compared the median listing price for the 10 rainiest cities in the continental United States to the national average. We found that the rainiest cities did have a lower listing price than the national average. The median listing price of the top 10 rainiest cities was $167,813, 5 percent lower than the national average of $176,800. The proverb seems to only have a slight influence on home prices being a little lower in the rainiest cities.
Top 10 Rainiest Cities
1. Forks, Wash.
Forks may be most notable for providing the setting for Stephanie Meyer?s bestselling ?Twilight? novels, but it is also the rainiest city in the continental United States. Meyer has stated that she chose Forks from a search of the rainiest U.S. regions. This city is so rainy, there is actually a temperate rainforest nearby. Rainforests are categorized by high rainfall greater the 68 inches per year, and with an average 101.72 inches per year, Forks is our only rainforest city.
2. Astoria, Ore.
Just under the threshold for rainforest, Astoria only gets two-thirds the rain of Forks, but still comes in as the second rainiest city. Astoria is a coastal city located on the mouth of the Columbia River, and this beautiful green city has been the film location for many movies, including ?The Goonies,? ?Short Circuit,? ?The Black Stallion,? ?Kindergarten Cop,? ?Free Willy,? ?Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III? and ?Into the Wild.?
3. Mobile, Ala.
The third rainiest city, with a population of about 195,000, Mobile is the rainiest major city in the U.S. Mobile gets much of its rain off the Gulf of Mexico, including rain from tropical storms and hurricanes. The Gulf of Mexico brings the rain, but also is a major part of Mobile?s economy; the Port of Mobile is the 12th largest in the United States.
4. Pensacola, Fla.
Just about an hour away from Mobile is the fourth rainiest city, Pensacola. This city, nicknamed the ?World?s Whitest Beaches,? is known more for its white sand beaches than clouds and rain. This is a popular vacation spot, but if you want to avoid the rain, don?t come down to Pensacola during the late summer. Most of Pensacola?s rainy days come in the summer months, averaging about 14 days of rain in July and August.
5. New Orleans, La.
The birthplace of jazz, New Orleans is the fifth rainiest. Rain in the form of hurricanes has been particularly disastrous to New Orleans due to its low elevation. Large portions of New Orleans are at or below sea level and kept dry by floodwalls and levees, the failure of which caused much of the flooding and destruction resulting from Hurricane Katrina.
6. Tallahassee, Fla.
The sixth rainiest city on our list is the capital of Florida, Tallahassee. Like the other Gulf Coast cities, Tallahassee also gets intense rain during the summer, but unlike the other cities, hurricanes that hit this region have only hit Tallahassee with outer rain and wind bands. A hurricane has not hit Tallahassee directly since Hurricane Kate in 1985.
7. Baton Rouge, La.
Another capital city, Baton Rouge comes in seventh on the rainiest city list. Rain falls fairly evenly all year long with an average of nine rainy days per month. Despite being more inland, Baton Rouge is still close to the coast and has exposure to hurricanes. Hurricane Gustav in 2008 was the worst hurricane to strike Baton Rouge and shut down the city for five days.
8. West Palm Beach, Fla.
Just an hour north of Miami, but three inches a year rainier, West Palm Beach came in as the eighth rainiest city. A tourist destination for sunshine, this southern Florida city rains 136 days a year. The only city on the list located on the Atlantic Ocean, West Palm Beach still gets rain from tropical storms and hurricanes, but on average has much drier winters than the Gulf Coast cities. Tourists to West Palm Beach in search of sunshine should come October to May, not the rainy summer months.
9. Port Arthur, Texas
Texas has weather extremes, from rainy Port Arthur in the southeast to dry El Paso in the west. Port Arthur, the ninth rainiest city, is located on the eastern boarder of Texas with Louisiana. A former boomtown, Port Arthur is home to 13 refineries and chemical plants, but despite the wealth in industry, Port Arthur is suffering economically. Twenty-four percent of the population lives below the poverty line, and unemployment is in the double digits, both of which contribute to the lower median home listing price of $137,620.
10. Meridian, Miss.
Meridian, the least rainy of the rainiest cities, is also the most inland. After the rain off the Gulf of Mexico dumps on Mobile and New Orleans, it heads north to make Meridian our No. 10. Rain is distributed fairly evenly over the year, with the occasional severe thunderstorm and even tornados.
Source: http://www.realestate.com/advice/april-showers-home-prices-infographic/
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